


are you aware the shape i'm in

by ladycivet (TheLannisterBastard)



Series: there's a hole in my soul [1]
Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, but not actually that much violence all things considered
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-24
Updated: 2017-08-24
Packaged: 2018-12-19 09:23:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11894760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLannisterBastard/pseuds/ladycivet
Summary: The daemon au no one asked for because daemon aus are my favorite thing and Deacon and all of his issues seemed like they would be fun to play with.





	are you aware the shape i'm in

**Author's Note:**

> So the concept of daemons is taken from the His Dark Materials universe here's the blurb from the wiki, it's pretty much all you need to know. 
> 
>  
> 
> _A dæmon /ˈdiːmən/ is a type of fictional being in the Philip Pullman fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials. Dæmons are the external physical manifestation of a person's 'inner-self' that takes the form of an animal. Dæmons have human intelligence, are capable of human speech—regardless of the form they take—and usually behave as though they are independent of their humans. Pre-pubescent children's dæmons can change form voluntarily, almost instantaneously, to become any creature, real or imaginary. During their adolescence a person's dæmon undergoes "settling", an event in which that person's dæmon permanently and involuntarily assumes the form of the animal which the person most resembles in character. Dæmons and their humans are almost always of different genders._

It wasn’t unusual for Deacon to get himself into bad situations, wasn’t even unusual for him to get beaten and bruised. It _was_ unusual for things to go so far south that he was trapped in a building full of raiders who were about to torture him.

The raiders that had caught him as he was headed back to HQ were probably the most competent ones in the ‘wealth. Not only had they had managed to knock him out without him being able to fight back, they had also, somehow, found his daemon in her usual hidden pocket in his coat.

Janei was currently sitting across the room from him in what looked like an old bird cage. Her tiny form was visibly shaking as one of the raiders stalked around the room. He could feel her panic and fear leaking across their bond and he wanted nothing more than to scoop her up and press her against his chest.

“What the fuck do you want with us?” Deacon spat at the raiders. “Fresh out of caps and chems.” If that was all they wanted he was sure he could talk his way out of this.

“It’s not your caps or chems that we what from you,” one raider sneered. “We want _entertainment._ ”

_Well shit._

“Sorry boys but you aren’t quite my type,” Deacon said.

He hadn’t even been aware of the raider standing behind him until a gun was cracking against his forehead. Blood began to trickle down into his eyes.

From across the room he could hear sounds of the cage rattling but it meant little to him when he felt the sheer panic from Janei.

Deacon could feel more than see when the raider picked Janei up. Blood from the cut on his forehead had blinded him to most everything but the sickening bad-wrong feeling of his soul in another person’s hand was unmistakeable. It took every ounce of his self control not to retch right then and there.

“What a cute little rat,” the raider crooned sarcastically. “I wonder who’s going to scream more once we really get started.”

“She’s a _dormouse_ you idiot,” he spat, trying to conceal his fear.

“Rat, mouse -- either way, you’re both going to scream.”

The raider not holding Janei, the one that had pistol whipped him, was holding a knife and advancing towards Deacon. He couldn’t bring himself to panic, not with his entire being screaming about Janei being touched.  The prospect of being tortured didn’t mean much to him. If he lived, great, and if he died, oh well, but they were touching his _soul,_ and they were going to hurt her. The idea of being tortured and killed didn’t make him want to scream, but seeing someone leave the room holding his very soul brought an anguished cry to his lips.

“Give her back you fucking assholes,” he shouted. It felt like someone had broken every one of his ribs and was in the process of pulling them from his body. For the wasteland, he and Janei could travel a good distance from each other, but the raider was testing that.

The sudden bang of the door hitting the wall barely distracted him. It was only when he heard the loud crack of a gun that he was able to pull his gaze away from the doorway his daemon had disappeared through.

In the doorway stood Emma, gun pointing steadily at the dead raider. Deacon hadn’t even noticed that the man was dead, his ferret daemon winking out of existence. As Emma lowered her gun her crow daemon swooped through the door, Nick following close behind.

Nick glanced over Deacon, a look of worry on his face. He turned to Emma and they had a quick exchange he couldn’t quite make out before Nick headed out the door Janei had been taken through.

Emma knelt in front of Deacon, her hands tugging at the knots binding his feet to the chair.

“You doing okay, Deeks?” she asked as she moved to the rope around his hands.

“Janei,” he panted, not even bothering to mask the pain in his voice. “Someone still has her. Pulling her away. Hurts so bad.”

“I know. Nick’s going after them now. He’ll get them before they get too far.” Emma’s voice was reassuring but he could hear the undercurrent of worry. “Fucking hell -- okay, this knot is too much. Where’s a knife so I can cut you free?”

“Side table,” he said. “It fell under there when you came in.”

She scrambled to grab the knife and was in the process of cutting him free when the pain in his chest began to ease a little. Deacon nearly choked in relief.

“Nick must have got the other guy.” He was still speaking past a lump in his throat, but it didn’t feel like he was being actively choked. “They aren’t touching her anymore.”

“See you’re fine,” Emma said as the ropes gave way, “you’re both fine.”

Deacon knew she was saying the words more as a reassurance to herself than to him but it felt nice all the same.

Nick had his hat cradled in the crook of his arm when he returned, Janei’s head poking over the brim.

Deacon stumbled forward, tears running down his face from the relief of having his daemon safe again. As soon as he scooped her out of the hat she was scrambling to press herself against the hollow of his throat.

Emma and Nick let them compose themselves before heading out, Emma’s Joxton scouting ahead for any lingering raiders.

If there had been any justice in the world it would have been sunny when their little group finally made it back outside again, but it seemed the world had different plans. The clouds that had been lingering in the distance when he had been taken had moved fully into the city and had taken on the green tinge of a rad storm.

“Before you say anything we’re not going back in there,” Janei said.

“Wasn’t going to say you should,” said Nick, “but you guys need to get somewhere out of this storm.”

Emma considered the area and gestured east. “Ticon is probably the closest, unless we want to find some abandoned building.”

“No,” Deacon said a little too quickly. “Headquarters is close enough and leaks less than Ticon does.”

Never mind the fact that the old skyscraper swayed in the wind and creaked enough to give him nightmares.

Emma and her daemon shared one of their looks. “Alright, HQ it is then.”

 

* * *

 

Bunker Hill rose into the night sky like a beacon of hope, but it was the apartment buildings to the west of the bridge that captured Deacon’s attention. It had been nearly a month and he could still feel the anguish of Janei nearly being pulled from him. The thought made him shudder and Janei gave his fingers a reassuring nuzzle.

“Everything clear, Jox?” Emma called.

With a flutter of black feathers, Joxton landed on her shoulder. “Seems to be clear for a few blocks other than that one building full of mutants, and, of course Bunker Hill. Might be smart to stop there for the night.”

“What do you guys think?” Emma leaned up against an old mailbox that Deacon was almost positive had been used as a dead drop last year.

“I don’t sleep,” Nick said, “so whatever you two are more comfortable with.”

Deacon considered it for a moment. “Why stay at the Hill and have to pay for some shitty beds when we can go mooch off of High Rise for the night?”

Emma laughed. “To Ticon it is then.”

The agent on the other side of the speaker must have been someone new not to recognize their group through the pinhole camera installed above the elevator. In any case, it was easy enough to feed the code phrase back through the crackly speaker.

The elevator ride was short, but it still made Deacon uneasy. He’d lived through so many things, things he didn’t have any right to live through, but the idea of being so high up still made him uncomfortable. When the doors opened, it wasn’t High Rise and Eloise waiting for them, but some agent Deacon had only ever seen in passing -- he thought her name was something like Marvel or Marva or something, her daemon a large moth resting on her shoulder.

“High Rise is waiting in the office,” she told them before walking off without another word.

The agents in the common area Deacon _did_ recognize. Stranger, the newest escaped synth turned recruit, whose daemon had yet to settle on a form and who was currently missing, was chatting with Cannon and his green snake daemon, Raza. Laurel was at what passed as a kitchen table, her nose buried in a pile of paperwork as her shaggy cat daemon wound between her feet. Each of them waved as he passed through on the way to the office.

Emma and Nick split off from him once they were up the short set of stairs, Nick to chat with another agent, and Emma to one of the rooms to get some much needed sleep.

Inside the office High Rise was waiting, his daemon sitting primly on a stack of ruined terminals in an attempt to gain some height. The fact that High Rise’s daemon was a little stubby legged dog never failed to amuse Deacon. When he’d come with Emma on that first mission, she had called the dog a word that sounded more like a sneeze than anything else. Dachshund, that’s what it had been.

“So what brings you to this side of the river Dee?” High Rise asked.

“Oh, you know,” Deacon said, taking a seat on the couch, “mischief, mayhem. The usual.”

“Oh, well if that’s all,” Eloise said hopping onto High Rise’s lap.

“Alright,” Deacon conceded, “we were clearing out a new spot for the Minutemen a little ways away from here. We were going to stay at the Hill for the night, but then I thought it would be more fun to crash here with you.”

High Rise snorted. “You just wanted to sleep somewhere where you won’t have to pay for coffee in the morning.”

Deacon grinned at him. “Can you blame a guy for that? Helps that I’ve never had better coffee than when Cannon makes it. How are things, besides the coffee?”

“Stressful.” Most of the levity was gone in an instant as High Rise leaned forward. “Gen ones and twos have been hanging around here enough to have us all on edge. Stranger’s cleared them out twice but they keep sending more.”

“I’ll mention it to Dez, see if she has any ideas.”

“I appreciate it, man.”

“So,” Deacon said, tapping his foot, “guess I’ll go try to grab some shut eye. If you can think of anything else HQ needs to know you can tell me in the morning. Is my old room still there or…?”

“It’s not going anywhere, Dee.”

Deacon, unsure of what to say to that, stood with a nod and headed out into the hallway.

His room was largely as he had left it. The more valuable things he had left were long gone, salvaged for one of Tom’s projects or sold at the Hill for some caps, but other than that things were still the same. The bed was still crammed between the wall and the desk, the windows still papered over, the trashcan still full of notes he really hoped High Rise had never read.

“We should probably get rid of those,” Janei said. “Someone’s going to get curious and then get concerned enough to tell Dez.”

“Maybe in the morning.” He helped her into the small hammock that he’d attached to the bed specifically for her. “For now, sleep.”

Janei let out the tiniest scoff but said nothing.

Hours later they were still awake. Deacon’s eyes were tracing patterns on the ceiling, distracting himself from the ominous creaking of the building. When even that couldn’t keep him distracted he sighed and climbed out of the bed, scooping Janei up as he stood. Maybe if they wandered around the lower levels for a little while, they’d get tired enough to sleep.

Out in the hallway Nick was sitting next to one of the clusters of candles, a stack of Unstoppables comics sitting next to him.

“Quality reading materials you’ve got there,” Deacon noted. He gestured to the pile. “Want to read me a bedtime story?”

“I’m not reading you a bedtime story at nearly two in the morning,” Nick said setting down the issue he had been reading.

“Alright, buzzkill,” Deacon said, “share the comics at least, then?”

Nick handed over the first few issues wordlessly before going back to reading the one he had set aside.

Halfway through the third issue, Deacon felt his mind begin to wander away from the pages to focus on the man sitting next to him.

“So, comics,” he blabbered, “are they a pre-war Nick thing, or something that’s purely synth detective.”

Nick raised an eyebrow, or would have if he had real eyebrows.

Deacon raised his hands defensively. “Just trying to make conversation. I could have asked something totally invasive, like ‘what was it like leaving the Institute,’ or ‘how’d your face get all torn up?’”

Nick chuckled. “Well, when you put it like that. The comics are a recent thing. The other Nick never had time for them. And even when he did have downtime,” he nodded towards the lump in Deacon’s shirt that was Janei, “he had someone to talk to.”

He set the comic aside again, expression thoughtful. “You know, when they first pulled me out of that garbage pile, I wondered how I was going to be me without Essa. Back before, she was the one people remembered, not me. My face was just one of the crowd but Essa stood out. She was an irish setter, gorgeous red dog with fur that seemed to float, and oh her voice could have charmed a raider into going straight. Without her I was expecting everyone to just forget me, but the exposed metal and glowing eyes sorta threw that idea out the window.”

Deacon snorted. “Don’t know what you’re talking about Nick; you blend in just fine.” Before he could think through his words he blurted out, “So what’s it like? Not having a daemon?”

Nick didn’t seem offended by the question. He shrugged a little before answering, “Not that different. Quieter, for sure, and maybe a little lonelier sometimes, but just because she’s not physical doesn’t mean she doesn’t exist.” He tapped his chest. “She’s in there somewhere, probably yelling at me for being too reckless.”

If anyone else had told him something like that, Deacon would have called bullshit; no one existed without a daemon, but Nick was unique. It made sense that his experience with his daemon would be unique as well.

“You know what I miss most about having Essa around?” Nick asked after a pause.

“The fact that at least half of you was good looking?” Deacon joked, earning him a light punch on the arm.

“I miss being able to touch her. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve reached out to scratch her head only to knock something over.” Nick was staring down at his right hand, metal fingers flexing once. “It’s hard sometimes, seeing everyone with that other part of themselves, seeing that intimacy I had with Essa. I miss it.”

Deacon wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say to that. Janei glanced up at him and a sudden wave of her determination flowed through their bond.

Her steps were tentative, each one thought out in great detail, and after half a heartbeat Deacon knew what she was about to do. It was one thing to ride along in Nick’s coat pocket, or to rest in his hat. It was another to seek out physical contact with him. When she buried herself under his intact hand, Deacon couldn’t help but suck in a shocked breath.

During the course of their life, Janei had been touched by six people that weren’t Deacon. Six occasions where every part of him had felt wrong and broken and violated. Those six times were among his worst memories. He should have felt violated and horrified to have Nick’s fingers gently scratching at the top of her head, but instead he felt… good. There was an electric buzzing in him directly correlated to how much Nick’s hand moved against Janei. It wasn’t even close to anything he had experienced before; it made his heart race and the hair on his arms stand on end.

“You okay?” Nick asked lifting his hand off of the daemon.

Deacon nodded, his head still spinning. “We’ve never… she’s never…” he couldn’t get the words out right, “I didn’t know someone else touching her could feel like that. Feel good, I mean.”

Nick frowned. “You really don’t trust anyone do you?”

“I barely let people know she exists, Nick. All the new recruits think I’m a synth with a daemon off doing other things, or that i’ve gone through intercision.” He shuddered at the thought. “Letting someone touch her...never thought it would happen.”

The look on Nick’s face was definitely one of concern, although concern about what, Deacon couldn’t say.

“Sometimes if I really want to fuck with new people,” Deacon added, trying for a lighter tone, “I’ll tell them she’s a deathclaw out roaming in the Glowing Sea. A few of them have even believed me.”

Nick snorted. “That’s a bunch of bullshit.”

“Okay, one of them believed me for about half an hour, but that still counts.”

“You just go on and keep telling yourself that.”

After that, their conversation took on a lighter note. At some point they moved into Deacon’s room, Nick perched on the desk while Deacon laid sprawled out on the bed. When the windows were just starting to lighten, Deacon found himself yawning.

“You should sleep,” Nick told him.

“Not tired.”

“Bullshit.”

Deacon sighed. “Fine I am.” He put on his best damsel in distress voice. “But won’t the chivalrous detective stay with me and keep me warm?”

“It’s _March_ ,” Nick said indignantly. “Something tells me you aren't going to freeze to death without me.”

He went to turn away but before he could make it out the door Deacon reached out and grabbed his hand.

“Stay,” he said, his voice catching in his throat, “please.”

There was a moment, not even a heartbeat long, where he thought Nick would leave anyway. Instead he turned back and sighed.

“Alright, but only if you sleep, okay?”

Deacon tapped two fingers over his heart, and that seemed to be enough to pacify Nick.

The bed was small for two people, but after some careful adjusting of limbs they settled into a comfortable position. Deacon’s back was against the wall, Nick’s to the door, Janei nestled down into the blanket by Deacon’s neck.

In the dark, Nick’s eyes were like tiny suns, casting a warm yellow glow on the small space between the two of them.

Nick’s voice was a hoarse whisper when he spoke. “Thank you for earlier. She’s not my Essa, but I can’t tell you what it means to me to be able to touch a daemon again.”

Deacon didn’t think when he leaned forward and  planted a quick kiss on the detective’s lips.

“For you, Nick? Anytime.”

**Author's Note:**

> So yeah, I'll probably add more to this 'verse eventually since I seriously love daemon AUs, like they are by far and away my favorite AUs and more of them should exist. I also have obscenely detailed headcanons about how daemons would function in the fallout 'verse and I would love to scream about them if asked. My tumblr is [ here. ](michiopa.tumblr.com)
> 
> My daemon form choices are based more in daemons-as-personlity-typing than HDM canon logic. None of their names have any meaning but Janei is a blatant asoiaf reference.
> 
> Deacon - Japanese doormouse  
> Nick (pre-war) - Irish setter  
> Emma - Carrion crow
> 
> Huge thank you to my roommate for editing for me. You're a delight, Sarah.


End file.
